Café Le Cordon Bleu, Opéra au Thé Vert

Sunday was rain but not so much or so cold that I couldn't run. It did stop me from taking photos along the way, but I did some reconnaissance along the way that made the trip a little longer. My goal was to get a new cake from Paris S'éveille, in response to a cake-off win. Previously they had two new cakes that I was not excited about, because they were coffee flavored, but I've had another similar cake with coffee and tonka beans and it was fine. At the shop, though, they only had one that was coffee cream on coffee gelatin, which I'm pretty sure would make me sick, so I gave up. I'll check again next month (actually, I'll probably be back before that for a cake-off, since they have so many great cakes). I've had plenty of pastries from there (including great ones), so I'm not stiffing them on what they are due in terms of number of items tried. Still need to get back to the two cake-off winners after that, but they're both open after work on a workday.

Instead, I ran back and stopped at Café Le Cordon Bleu, which is one of the shops I've labeled as quite good based on only two cakes. The cake I choose as the third was Opéra au Thé Vert, which is chocolate and chocolate. It was mostly green tea, and maybe its legitimate for it too seem watery, since so is green tea, but I don't find that acceptable in cake. My experience with green tea is maybe too limited (I tend to drink the same cheap stuff at work every day) for the nuance of the chocolate to get through. I've going to give this the benefit of the doubt and say it was okay, since it was reasonable, but the shop goes straight to the good group, where I'll probably never hear from it again, since it's going to be a long time before I'll want fourth cakes from Tokyo cake shops that are just average. Next in the list of holiday only places: Ces Jours. Actually, I only have a few to go, and not so many workday-accessible ones.

Café Le Cordon Bleu: Earlgrey Chocolate, Macaron Chocolat Gianduja

Saturday, went to a new place for cake for two, which is to say I had half of each of these first two cakes, Café Le Cordon Bleu (supposedly the current name, though the old name is still on the receipt: Le Cordon Bleu La Boutique). It is close to the old Asakura Family Estate, which dates from early Showa (about a hundred years ago), which is a cheap (100 yen/person) visit. Back to the cafe, it is self-serve and has a limited selection of cake, pastries, bread, and simple cafe lunch, salad maybe. On a Saturday, they ran out of at least one of our cakes shortly after us, maybe a little before 3 pm.

Both of these are chocolate (there was also a strawberry mousse/cream and a cream puff), but are quite different. One is Earlgrey Chocolate, a fairly standard mousse cake, but definitely good. The tea gives, well a tea taste, but I would say it makes the chocolate a little fruity. The other cake is a macaron, Macaron Chocolate Gianduja, and I advised cutting it, though it turned out that picking it up was very possible, as there is a center of chopped nuts (I assume hazelnuts) in chocolate that acted as a central post while not offering resistance to biting (so it was sort of sticky rather than solid). This sort of heavy cake is more my preference, so I thought this was excellent. Based on two cakes, it seems a quite good shop, which is a fairly good find for just a local shop I noticed on my neighborhood route.

Il Pleut sur la Seine, Chou à la Crème

Typhoon coming again, so there should be strong winds tonight and tomorrow, but it's crossing Japan on the west side, so should not be too bad in Tokyo away from the sea, rivers, mountains, and lowlands. Did a run out to Sarugakucho to visit Il Pleut sur la Seine, the most recent cake-off winner. Maybe because they had been closed a few days, the selection of cakes was pretty weak. The best I could do was a Chou à la Crème. Once in a while these are special, but this one was pretty much standard, which is what I would expect from this shop. That works for me with their saint-marc, but not for this. Still, it was good. It's smallish, but with a fairly complete but thin shell. The filling is whipped cream and custard cream, sort of lightly mixed, but thankfully no fruit. The only other new fresh "cake" was a banana version; I think I'll pass on that as long as there are other options.

Didn't say much about this week's running in the last post. Monday, I just went down to Tokyo Midtown, so just around 40 minutes of running, but I tried to do a good bit of it fast. As a result, I had a lot of foot pain Tuesday, which seems to be the routine. It didn't hurt so much by the time I ran again in the evening, but was tough every time I stood up from sitting at a desk for long. Did a lot of stretches through the day for my heel. So didn't run that fast Tuesday but was my more usual 60+ minutes (or 70+, I had to go to my back up). Wednesday, it was back to being a pretty hot run, as was Thursday. Wednesday I had already eaten my cake, so I could semi-sprint the last 400 m and actual build some muscle. Thursday, I was carrying cake and it was too hot to do that. Both days, I was tempted to walk home, but told myself that I could run as slowly as I wanted to, which worked. I'm actually more comfortable running and it's easier in a way to just fall forward and keep catching yourself running than walking. Once I get moving coming back, even on the hills, I'm okay plodding along. I'm missing the few cools days we had last week, though. It's going to be hot and humid after the typhoon.

Cake-off: Jean-Paul Hévin's Mont-Pomme Caramel over Il Pleut sur la Seine's Le Saint-Marc

Monday, which was a holiday, I did a cake-off. This month's special mont-blanc is at Jean-Paul Hévin is the Mont-Pomme Caramel. To match it, I ran to Il Pleut sur la Seine for the somewhat caramel Le Saint-Marc. Due to a post about medieval walking patterns, I did the run on the balls of my feet, versus heels, which is not the most efficient, but it's good for posture and seems good for my foot problems, so I did it again Tuesday, but I'm getting ahead of myself. The run was about 5 km each way, a low 9 km/h going out and a high 8 km/h coming back.

Another tough cake-off, though both were good enough that they don't need to be denoted, though It's hard to say whether I would rate them great, which always depends on the day. In the end, I have to go with the Mont-Pomme Caramel, which is more interesting and certainly there is more to it (for barely more money), both in terms of volume and interesting elements.

(Thur) Il Pleut sur la Seine: Croissant aux Amandes

In order to get the name of yesterday's cake, I went back to P. Il Pleut sur la Seine. I didn't get cake, though that would perhaps have been less decadent, as they did not have bostock, so I got Croissant aux Amandes (380 yen). As usually, this had almond paste inside, which makes it very heavy, but there was also almond paste (I assume) on top, like a layer of icing. When I bought cake yesterday, they gave me a sample Gallete Bretonne (which would normally be about 300 yen, so not a bad get), whereas today they gave me Baton Fromage (I was not really expecting anything with a pastry, but it cost almost as much as a cake, and I imagine at least double the calories). The latter two "secs" were definitely good, but I'm less interested in them than cakes and pastries (and demi-secs, like financiers). I had some shopping to do, stopping by Nikunohanamasa for roasted peanut pieces, so it was about 12 km total. Even with the temperature down, it was humid and not cool, and frankly I'm out of shape/practice for running fast, so I was still only 9 km/h.

Il Pleut sur la Seine: Deauville

Hottest day of the year so far, so even in the evening was hot, though not necessarily the worst night for running so far. It's about 5 km each way to Il Pleut sur la Seine by the shortest path, not that the shortest is exactly what I use, but not so different, and I was between 8 and 9 km/h. I also got a free baked good (as I often do from them), so maybe I'll go cake-free tomorrow in preparation for the next cake-off and just have that.

I was not initially sure what I got, as only parts of the name stuck in my head, but I've confirmed that it sounds like Deauville, which fits. I needed another run to confirm the name, but neglected to confirm the ingredients, so maybe there will be a further update. The cake is definitely a mousse dome and definitely has apple (which is as far as I read and remember), and I'm guessing cassis as the red part, though I couldn't identify what the other fruit flavor was. I think that they are big on healthy cakes, as well as classics, and this might fall into the former category (there was a lentil-biscuit cake on the other end of the case). My main meals are extreme healthy, so I don't need that in my cake. Still, this was good and competently made. However, just good is not enough to keep the shop among the Quite Excellent shops, so I'm finally bumping them down to Excellent. Still, they have had two great cakes and at least one is still in the line-up, so I'll probably be back for that again before too long for a cake-off, since I'm doing a good job of making my first pass through the available great cakes.

(Friday) Il Pleut sur la Seine: Relaxation

Ran to Il Pleut sur la Seine again, probably at closer to 9 km/h this time. The cake was, I think, Relaxation (my katakana transcription was a little shaky in the middle). It seems to be in the family of roll cake. The meringue on top is interesting and the cake is courser than just typical sponge, but beyond that it's basically fruit (can't remember what, maybe peach) with custard. It was definitely good but not something that I need, which leaves this shop not so different from many Excellent shops, so I'll have to consider who is more deserving of Quite Excellent status. Toshi Yoroizuka certainly seems to be, but I'll need one more to balance out Henri le Roux's exit from the fresh cake biz.

On the plus side, they also gave me a financier, which I certainly appreciate. As a non-fresh cake, particularly a wrapped one, I did not expect it to more than good, but it is definitely that.

Il Pleut sur la Seine: Polonaise

Finally got to Il Pleut sur la Seine again after upgrading it to the superb cake shop list to replace Abricotier. Today's cake brings me up to 5 cakes reviewed for here (so still 2 more to catch up). It was a slow after yesterday's long run following a training run the day before that. So I did not make any of the lights through Omotesando (I did stretches while I waited). I'm consider altering my path going that way on slow days to try to at least line up with a pedestrian bridge crossing the street between Omotesando Station and Harajuku Station. There and back, about 5 km each, were both at exactly the same speed, close to 9 km/h.

The "cake" for today is Polonaise, which is a brioche Polonaise, so perhaps actually a pastry, but I think the meringue is enough to push it over into the cake category, at least for me, especially after allowing Fondant Choc
olat yesterday. This is a brioche (which is a sweet bread) spiked with kirsch, filled with candied fruit (so it tasted like fruit cake), with a little bit of custard at the center and a lot of meringue (more than 1 cm thick) covering it, with sliced almonds. It sounds like a mess and not something I would be into, maybe, and actually it did become messy because my eating strategy was to cut out radial wedges, which obviously imbalances it, and it tastes like a baba, which I'm not excited about, but it all works well together and it was excellent.

Il Pleut sur la Seine: Chiboust Poire

Was feeling tired today, though less so (relative to other return runs) on the way back, so it all came about to about 9 km/h for around 10 km total. I am looking particularly at the excellent shops that I've only had three cakes from to see whether any are candidates as new potentially quite excellent shops. It could still wash out later, but I got another great cake, so Il Pleut sur la Seine gets promoted.

The cake was a Chiboust Poire (670 yen). I like a good chiboust, which not everyone makes. This shop seems to do best with the standards, probably related to them having their own school. Eventually I should compare this with other chibousts that I've said are great and see really stands out, but for now I'm just happy to have something different and something great. Basically, the base is like a pear tart, and then you have the eggy part and a top hard
caramelized layer.

I also received a Galette Noir, which was excellent, as far as I can tell from just one cookie.